Many power plants operate by heating water to produce steam. The steam is then used to drive a turbine. The turbine rotates a generator that is used to produce electricity.
The water chemistry in power plants of this type is typically monitored at several locations within the system. Trend graphs are then constructed using the collected chemistry data. Trained chemistry personnel review the data to insure that the impurity and additive levels are within prescriptive specifications and to identify underlying trends in the data which may indicate abnormal operation of the system.
Data acquisition systems have been developed for collecting and displaying power plant water chemistry data. Rule based expert systems have also been developed to identify inconsistencies in the data and warn of possible abnormal conditions. Existing expert systems are limited to rudimentary analyses of chemistry data.
It would be highly desirable to improve existing prior art techniques of analyzing power plant water chemistry. In particular, it would be highly desirable to provide an automated technique for improving the reliability of power plant water chemistry data. In addition, it would be highly desirable to provide an automated technique for assessing power plant water chemistry data to diagnose problems therein.